


My Judaism

by zephyrprince



Category: Glee
Genre: Asian Jews, Asian-American Character, Biracial Character, Character of Color, Character of Faith, Gay Parents, Gen, Hanukkah, Hebrew, Jewish Character, Judaism, Korean-American Character, Ohio, Purim, Religion, Season/Series 01, US Source
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2010-02-22
Updated: 2010-02-22
Packaged: 2017-10-07 11:46:52
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,342
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/64860
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/zephyrprince/pseuds/zephyrprince
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Three Jews. Three holidays. One religion?</p>
            </blockquote>





	My Judaism

Tina knew historically there had been Jews in Asia. She had always been pretty interested in the most far-flung children of Zion – the Persian Jews, the Cochin Jews, Bukharan Jews. There had even been a long-time community in Kaifeng, China, but Tina wasn't one of them. She wasn't even Chinese. She was mixed – Korean father, Jewish mother – and the fact remained that she stuck out in their synagogue like a sore thumb. In her earliest years, her parents had quibbled briefly over sending her to Hebrew School or Korean School, but soon compromised and concluded that she would attend neither. And that's how she felt, too – too Asian to be a Jew and not quite Asian enough to be Asian. When people looked at her she just knew they thought of her as Asian first – she didn't even look particularly mixed. When people talked about the beautiful half-Asians, they didn't mean her.

She didn't go to temple often. She always felt completely out of place. Regardless of what they were actually thinking, she couldn't help but look around and assume that everyone felt she didn't belong. Maybe she was adopted or maybe she was a stepchild from a second marriage, but not really one of them. She felt that much was certain.

On High Holy Days, she grinned and bore it. It made her mom happy. She hadn't had a Bat Mitzvah, and the only other Jews she ever hung out with were Rachel and Noah and she was sure they thought of her as Asian, only remembering her other heritage when her last name was pronounced. Plus, who was she kidding? They didn't really hang out so much as just coexist during glee rehearsals.

Through all of this, though, Tina still felt Jewish. Her last name, כֹּהֵן , indicated her ancestors were once priests in The Temple. Ironically, it also meant that her mother was even more specifically forbidden to marry a non-Jew or even a convert, but the little prejudices didn't put her off. Somehow she felt connected to all that history even if no one else saw it in her. And it didn't make her less Korean. It just meant she was half. She breathed a heavy sigh and set her eyes straight forward as she recited the Amidah.  
****

  
כתיבה וחתימה טובה

O

Just because he didn't think about faith much, didn't mean Noah Puckerman wasn't Jewish. If anyone asked him, that's still what he'd say, and he resented all assumptions otherwise. There were a fair number of Jews around Lima but, obviously, most people were not, and it was against them that he found himself railing – mostly in little moments, mostly when no one else even noticed. This was particularly true in December. He replied to the ubiquitous wishes of "Merry Christmas" with a fervent "Happy Holidays" or, if he was feeling feisty, "Happy Chanukah."

He insisted that he get all eight days of light off school. Figgins let him because, well, what'd he know about Judaism? So Puck spent the holiday in his own way, smoking up in his car in giant empty church parking lots, glad to be blaspheming in some small way and equally glad to be missing the jazzed up version of "Rudolph, The Red Nosed Reindeer," they'd been working on with glee.

Of course, when it came right down to it, Noah always really enjoyed December 25th even if they didn't celebrate like Christians. It was pretty fun to go to the movies with his fam and then head out to Chinese, inevitably running into all the others for whom Jesus was not so meaningful. It meant all the decorations and shit could be taken down at the mall and all the radio stations would cease their incessant caroling. It meant everyone could get over their cheery dispositions and just get back to the grouchy, depressing Ohio winter.

One particular December 25th many, many years ago, Noah and his family were just coming out of Jingle All The Way, when the young preschool Puck found himself deep in thought. The somewhat ironic film choice had been made more due to Ms. Puckerman's taste for the second-billed Sinbad than anything else, but the content of the film stuck with Noah all the way to their customary strip mall buffet.

Eventually with a heaping plate of lo mein in hand, the boy got up the gumption to ask, "Mom, why doesn't Santa Clause visit our house? Is it because I'm on the naughty list?"

His mother was startled and saddened, and with a quick tongue, she ripped into the contemporary Christmas mythology, denouncing it as sugar-fueled lies that cause long-term sappiness and even hallucinations for the goyim.

"And anyway," she added, "Our people have suffered for thousands of years, and if we occasionally have to get a little naughty just to get by, then so be it."

She rubbed little Noah on the head, mussing his hair. Noah smiled a mischievous smile. If naughty was customary, then naughty he could do.  
****

  
חנוכה שמח

O

Kids can be cruel even in Hebrew School. It wasn't that the kids cared Rachel's dads were gay – their Reform curriculum taught that the whole diverse range of family formations were equal. What they were unsure about, however, was where this put her status halackhically. The rabbi never talked about it but they had all heard that their culture passed through the matrilineal line. So they poked and teased, discussed and debated.

Every Sunday night that year before she went to sleep, Rachel looked at herself in the mirror and examined her features. She knew she was adopted, but when she looked at her nose and inspect her cheekbones, she couldn't help but think she was Jewish. She had to be.  
The truth was that she loved being Jewish. She loved the traditions – lighting candles, singing prayers, and being told that she was special, chosen. That's how she felt, like she was destined for something greater.

So eventually Rachel did the only thing she knew to do – script out the situation. She didn't tell her dads because she didn't want to hurt them.

At one particular Purim party, she'd had enough of the teasing. She grabbed a gragger and flung it around in the air to call everyone's attention to her. She stepped up on a large Hebrew alphabet block-cum-soap box and addressed her peers in her young but already frenetic and rapid stage voice.

"Hello everyone and happy Purim. I have a few short announcements to make regarding my place in this community. As many of you know, the status of my Judaism has been called into question with increasing frequency recently because of my unknown genetic parentage and subsequent adoption by my two fathers.

"Well, I am pleased to now share with you several points of interest on this matter. First and foremost, the tradition of passing down our Judaism through matrilineal descent has a completely unclear origin, probably coming to us from the Rabbinic period but never specifically spelled out in the Torah. Secondly, the contemporary Reform Movement within our faith community has long affirmed the childhood conversion of adoptees and children of interfaith marriages, and it is very important to note our scriptural obligation that once such a convert has been affirmed in our community, we are never, ever supposed to remind them of their origins from the outside.

"And finally, and most importantly, my beloved classmates, it is my belief that what I have been put through is inconsistent with the spirit of Judaism. Where is our sense of tikkun olam? Where is our golden rule? And so I plead with all of you, please can we give one another the respect that we want for ourselves. We are all the chosen people. We are all of us Jews."

And with that Rachel stepped down from her perch and went to munch on the hamantaschen. The room was stunned with perhaps an edge of mocking, but their overt teasing ceased from that day forward, and regardless of their attitudes, Rachel remained completely self-assured.  
****

  
חג פורים שמח


End file.
